She took the glass and sipped. “What happened?”
“I thought you could tell me.”
“I told you I left.” She lifted her head and faced Ness. “Was it bad?”
Ness caught her eye, then looked away. “Yes, it was very bad.” He took the drink from Davida’s hands. “There’re going to be lots of questions. The police have been here—”
“The redheaded detective?”
“Different guys. Two clowns from Burbank—one of them couldn’t take his eyes off the women’s asses, the other one was clearly on a fishing expedition. They know some details, but not enough to cause damage.”
“Did you get rid of them?”
“Only temporarily, Davie. They’re not interested in me. I didn’t even know King. But they’re real interested in talking to you.”
She took the tumbler back from him and finished the Scotch. “I was here all day yesterday. You know that. You were with me—”
“Davida…” Ness took her hand. “I can vouch that I saw you yesterday. But I was also teaching class yesterday. I was in the weight room, I was at the pool, I took the ten o’clock broth break with the ladies in the snack bar. I was with other people and…” He sighed. “And you were not there.”
The old lady just sat there, tears streaming down her cheeks. Ness patted bony, liver-spotted knuckles. “Don’t worry. We’ll figure something out.”
Davida bit her nail and blinked away tears. “I swear I don’t know what happened. I wouldn’t hurt my own flesh and blood. You know I…” She started crying again.
Ness buried his face in his hands, wondering how the bitch lied with such facility. Then he remembered what acting was all about.
Or maybe she was genuinely grief-stricken. Her son was dead. But what did she expect, sending in some errand boy. She knew King had an explosive temper! But women like Davida never thought about consequences. Just like his mom. Users. They went on their merry way, exploiting their kids as if they were property. She was talking to him.
“…police say when they were coming back?”
“No, they never do. They just pop up when you’re not expecting them.”
Davida wiped her eyes. “Like audit letters from the IRS.”
Ness smiled. “Freddy sent them out to Malibu—pretty clever stall on his part. You never answer the phones so the two of them are going to waste a couple of hours driving there and back. But you’re going to have to talk to them eventually.”
“What do I say?”
Ness shrugged. “You’re the performer.”
“I’m an actress, Michael, not a writer.”
“Then play it simple. Act the grieving mother and keep your mouth shut.”
Davida blinked her eyes in rapid succession. “I don’t have to act, Michael.”
“I’m sorry, Davida. But you should have known better. You should have let me handle Kingston.”
Davida nodded like a chastised little girl. God, she was sick. But the bitch had a way of evoking pity. Ness sighed.
“Does Lilah know?” Davida asked.
“Yes, Davida, she knows. The cops have already talked to her—”
“What’d she say?”
“I don’t know. She’s been incommunicado, doing nothing but exercising—”
“What?”
“Leading the one o’clock class, even as we speak. She gave Natanya the afternoon off so she could take over. You know Lilah. When she’s truly hysterical, she aerobicizes. She’s been at it all day and hasn’t eaten a thing. Freddy’s really worried about her, afraid she’s gonna drop dead.” Ness gave her a half smile. “Or maybe that’s what you want.”
And then Ness felt a whack across his face. It took him a few seconds before he realized she’d actually backhanded him. He touched his burning cheek, then shook his head. Didn’t know the bitch had it in her.
Davida said, “Don’t you ever—”
“Sorry.” Ness sipped his drink, then stroked his face. “Jesus, you pack a good wallop for an old broad.”
She grabbed his chin, turned his head, and inspected his imprinted face. “Yes, Michael, indeed I do.” She kissed his cheek. “When you were…there, did you happen to notice—”
“Davida, I was there for just a moment.” He pushed hair out of his eyes. “It was so…so messy…so…bloody. I just got the hell out. But I took care of some details for you, Davie.”
“What details?”
“Better that you don’t know.”
“But you didn’t—”
“No papers. Your errand boy came up dry. Or King got to him before he had a chance to really look.”
Davida’s eyes watered. “He was my son, Michael, and I loved him. I want you to know that. I never meant for him to die.”
“You don’t mean a lot of things, but you screw up a lot.” Ness stood and kissed her forehead. “I’ve got to go. Afternoon yoga with the ladies. If the cops come, I’ll do the best I can. You know that.”
“I know that.” Davida took out a handkerchief. “Thank you. You have been a luv.”
“That’s me, a real luv.” He took a final drink, then placed the tumbler on the bar. Reaching into his back pocket, he popped a peppermint candy into his mouth. Wouldn’t do at all if the starving girlies smelled Scotch on the breath of their health-conscious aerobic guru.
Then his heart started racing. He felt around his back pockets, then his front pockets. He patted his shirt, tried his pants again. His head started spinning.
His wallet was gone.
24
Marge hung up the phone. “The best Reed can do for us is forty-five minutes at three. If we leave right now, we should make it.”
Decker said, “Burbank’s not going to like it—especially Malone. He wanted to be in on the interview.”
“They’re en route to Malibu; we can’t exactly wait for them. Reed’s a busy guy.” Marge slung her purse over her shoulder. “We’ll take the recorder and play back the interview word for word. Besides, didn’t Morrison tell us to get the lead out?”
“If I move any faster on this case, I’m gonna turn into a sonic boom.” Decker stuffed his wallet in his pants. “All right, let’s do Reed…find out if he knows anything. I just wanted to avoid a stupid interdepartmental squabble. I have a feeling Donnie Malone might be the petty type.”
“So that’s his problem. He wants to field hotshot calls, let him apply to Southeast—get lowdown and funky in the pits.”
Decker regarded her. “Are you still interested in working Homicide?”
Her face became animated. “Why? Is there an opening?”
“Nothing official, Margie. But scuttlebutt says Devonshire might have an opening soon.”
Marge’s face fell. “An opening? As in room for one: as in white male?”
“Maybe they could be talked into two for one.”
“So what does that make me? A door prize?”
“Marjorie, you know the way the department works. If I say no, they’re not going to ask you to apply. So either I convince them to take you as a door prize or we both stay put. Stop getting touchy.”
There was a long silence.
“Do you want to work Homicide?” Marge said.
“It’s a challenging detail, but it’s also a lot more hours.” Decker shrugged. “At this point, it’s theoretical. I just wanted to sound you out, okay?”
Marge smiled. “I appreciate what you’re doing. I don’t mean to sound like an ingrate, but it’s infuriating.”
“I know it’s hard being passed over because you don’t have a dick. But I have one and if I can help you, why not?”
“You’re a good guy, Pete.”
“My daughter just told me that.”
“It must be true.” Marge winked. “Let’s go. I’ll drive.”
Decker looked out the window and thought: It’s good to get out of the squad room. The day was hot and clear, the freeways relatively empty. The drive was long but scenic, the unmarked trailblazing through wi
nding canyons shaded with copses of eucalyptus, leafy maples, and gnarled California oak that shimmered in the heat. Clusters of black birds dotted the aqua summer sky.
The Plymouth was making good time until it hit Hermosa Beach at Pacific Coast Highway. Traffic immediately jammed with stalled cars and reckless motorbikes weaving in and out of lanes. The right sides of the streets were marked for bike paths and were filled with latex-coated cyclists. The sidewalks were clogged with flower-shirted tourists weighed down by cameras around their necks, and pedestrians in skin tones ranging from deep tan to lobster red. Whizzing past the walkers were the skateboarders and the Rollerbladers dressed in Day-Glo surfing shorts and muscle shirts. Gull cries and bird songs competed for air space with boom boxes or the rowdy shouts of party animals stuffed onto balconies of apartment buildings.
On the right, PCH looked down upon several streets stacked with multifamily dwellings. The buildings had been erected without much thought to architectural conformity, although most were made of stucco and wood and had lots of windows. Beyond the houses was an expanse of steely-blue undulating with the rhythmic flows of whitecaps.
With the car stopped at a congested intersection, Marge’s eyes drifted from the ocean to the street scene. “Ah, to be young, single…and white. This place is Wonder bread.”
Decker squinted out the window. “I think I see a couple of blacks.”
“Nah, they’re not real blacks, more like…chocolate-dipped surfers.”
“I hear rap music.”
Marge waved him off. “Rap has been coopted by whites, Pete. Look at Vanilla Ice and his Xeroxes.” She laughed. “Everyone wanting what the other guy has—whites putting shit in their hair to get dreadlocks, blacks putting shit in their hair to turn it straight. No pleasing the human race.”
“It’s what makes us creative,” Decker said. “Turning the restlessness into art. Hey, Margie, how ’bout us writing a policeman’s rap:
“A cop’s lot in life is no easy shakes.
Criminals and felons and all sorts of fakes
Gettin in my face every night and every day,
Stalkin and waitin just to blow me away—”
“Keep your badge and gun, Sergeant.”
Decker’s expression was deadpan. “I’m wounded.”
Compulsively neat with a wide sweeping view of the ocean, the office looked more suited for a CEO than for a doctor. The walls were wainscoted—peach and hunter-green chintz print above the chair railing, deep-walnut paneling below. Reed’s desk was an old-fashioned mahogany partner’s desk, the legs carved into lions. But from the way it was positioned and the diplomas on the wall, it was clear the desk was used only by one person who demanded lots of space.
Decker made himself comfortable in one leather wing chair opposite the desk; Marge took the matching seat. Reed had seated himself erect in his desk chair, hands folded and resting on the desk, his lab coat sparkling white and stiffly starched. A man used to order. Decker bet he got anxious if things didn’t go as planned.
And he was anxious now. The straight-featured, bronzed face was knitted at the brow, the chestnut eyes dancing instead of focusing. Though his fingers were constrained, he was rocking his hands on the desktop. His mocha-colored hair was thin and combed to one side, a small strand resting on his forehead. Reed glanced at his clasped hands, then looked up.
“How can I help you?” Before they could answer, Reed went on, “Perhaps I should say, how can you help me? First, Lilah, now this terrible…I’m…”
Reed’s voice held the remnants of a refined British accent.
Decker said, “I’m sorry for your loss.”
“I’m…devastated!” Reed said. “Simply…”
“Were you and your brother close?” Marge asked.
“Close?” Reed tapped his folded hands on the desk. “I wouldn’t say close…but I was closer to him than I was to anyone else on the maternal side of my family. We had our professions in common; we used to meet for lunch and at staff meetings. We attended some of the same hospitals. We weren’t exceptionally close, but Kingston was still…I just can’t believe…”
He took a deep breath, got up and walked over to the water machine. “Can I offer you two any coffee or tea?”
“We’re fine, Dr. Reed.”
Reed played with a paper cup, then filled it with water and drank. “I…I don’t know anything about…” He crumpled the corrugated container and threw it into the garbage. “I don’t know how I could possibly help you. With Lilah as well. I’m…I’m not at all close to her. I don’t…”
He sank back into his desk chair.
“When was the last time you saw your brother?” Decker asked.
“Saw him?” Again Reed folded his hands. “I don’t remember. A few weeks ago. My girl would know. She makes my appointments. Kingston and I never met spontaneously. It was always…arranged. Either he’d call or I’d call. That sort of thing—Can I turn the recorder off? It’s making me feel quite uneasy.”
Decker turned off the machine, then pulled out his notebook and held it up. “You don’t mind this?”
“Not at all,” Reed said. “The recorder is just so…dehumanizing.”
“Indeed it is,” Decker said. “Were you in contact with Kingston after Lilah was attacked?”
“Contact?” Reed bit his lip. “I don’t…oh, he…called me, of course. He was very upset. I was upset as well. I’m not close to my sister, but…I felt terrible!”
“Did you visit Lilah in the hospital?” Marge asked.
Reed looked down. “No, I…didn’t. And I suppose that seems a bit callous. I did call. We spoke very briefly. I asked her if she needed anything and she said no, Mother and Freddy had everything under control. Which was the way it usually was when I spoke to Lilah. She has always…shut me out so…” He exhaled. “So, I suppose I stopped trying. Not that my life…has been empty without her, without any of them. My family is…very difficult. I do much better when there’s minimal contact.”
“But you had contact with Kingston,” Marge said.
“Yes, professional mostly. But personal as well.”
“Do you happen to know if you talked to him just prior to Lilah’s attack?” Decker asked.
“Perhaps.”
Decker waited for more, but Reed wasn’t forthcoming. “Did Kingston sound unusual?”
“In…what way?”
Decker shrugged. “Agitated, depressed, more cheerful than usual.”
“Kingston was never cheerful,” Reed said. “He was a very driven man.”
“Did he seem unusually driven lately?”
“I…yes, to me, King did seem more driven of late.” Reed sighed. “He called me about a week…before Lilah was attacked. He needed money.”
“Why?” Marge said. “Didn’t he have a thriving practice?”
“Several of them in fact,” Decker added.
“You know about his place in Burbank?” Marge asked.
Reed looked up sharply. “Yes, of course. Not that I approved…not that I disapproved…of abortion, that is. Just…he was making money, but that was only part of it.”
“Part of what?” Decker added.
“Of why he had his place in Burbank,” Reed said.
“It was the fetuses,” Marge said.
Reed grimaced. “So you know everything.”
“It was a guess,” Marge said.
A damn-good educated one, Decker thought as he wrote in his notebook.
“What was he doing with the fetuses?” Marge said.
Reed blew out air. “What he was doing wasn’t legal.”
“Go on,” Decker said.
“He was doing research using embryonic tissue. Research has been King’s passion since medical school…since we were young children actually. King always wanted to be a scientist, but Mother wanted him to be a doctor. She wanted all of us to become physicians.”
“So I’ve noticed,” said Marge.
“Mother was quite explicit about
her wishes. And Mother has a way of getting what she wants. Not that I’m sorry I went to medical school. But afterward I wasn’t about to devote my life to Mother’s needs. She’s an incurable hypochondriac and now poor Frederick bears the brunt of her neurosis. I’ve often urged him to break from her, but…” He bit his lip. “Where was I?”
“Kingston wanting to become a scientist,” Decker said.
“Yes, Kingston was very adaptable. So he selected medicine as his science of choice and forged ahead with his research. Nothing could dissuade him from that.”
Decker said, “I’m not familiar with Kingston’s professional history. Was he affiliated with any research institution, any university?”
Reed shook his head. “No. He dropped out of academia early on—too petty, too controlled by rules and regulations, too much game playing to get proper funding.”
“Your brother wasn’t much of a game player, was he, Doctor?” Decker said.
“If you knew my mother, you would understand why,” Reed said. “We were all pawns in Mother’s games—constantly competing against each other for Mother’s attention. Kingston had no tolerance for compromise. Even as a student, he used to complain how regimented the hospitals and medical schools were. He always said he was never going to rely on grants for his research. So he…he went into private practice and funded his own research.”
Reed took a breath.
“It took everything out of him. He never married, never…never bothered with social niceties. My wife and I…we tried to…I don’t know, make him realize there was another world outside, but he…research was his life.”
“Even if it meant bending a few rules and working illegally on aborted fetal tissue,” Decker said.
“Yes.” Reed nodded. “Yes, he bent rules—broke rules. But that was King. Once he had a bug in his brain, he was unstoppable.”
“What was he doing with the tissue?” Marge asked.
“Specifically?”
“Yes,” Marge said.
“He was grinding it up, running the cells through a French press to shear them open, precipitating the DNA, and protein-purifying the enzymes in an attempt to locate and isolate embryonic enzymes that might be distinctively beneficial to host-rejection of implant patients.”
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